The election commission of India is considering introduction of Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) to make the voting system more verifiable. On July 25, the commission will conduct a field trial of VVPAT in a simulated election in 36 polling stations distributed over five states.

The VVPAT system prints a paper ballot once the voter has cast his vote. The ballot contains the election symbol, name of the candidate and serial number for the voter to verify. 

“The real time and cost effectiveness of the system will be known only after the field trial,” said Dr Alok Shukla, deputy election commissioner, briefing the media the media about the new system in election commission headquarters on Tuesday.

In an all party meeting held in the commission on October 4 last year, some political parties had suggested introducing of VVPAT in the upcoming elections. 

The commission referred the matter to the technical expert committee on EVM comprising of P V Indiresan, former director of IIT, Madras and four serving professors of IIT.

The committee directed Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL) and Electronic Corporation of India Limited (ECIL) to make prototypes of VVPAT. 

In one system, the printer is completely sealed and inaccessible to the voter, It has a transparent window on the front side. The printed ballot remains in front of the transparent window foe 5 seconds for the voter to verify it. Thereafter it gets cut and automatically falls into a sealed box.

In the other system, the printer is kept open. The printed ballot will get cut and fall in a tray in front of the printer. The voter will pick it up from the tray, very it, fold it and bring it out of voting compartment and drop the same in a sealed box kept for this purpose in front of the presiding officer before leaving the polling station.